As I was heading back to Madrid from Seville, one of my former students (from 2014). . .
. . . reached out and said his grandmother’s flat in Paris was available and he and his wife would be heading over for a few weeks. He offered me the couch, which I promptly accepted.
I have been to Paris a few times but this unplanned side trip was unlike all my other visits. We stayed in a neighborhood of locals, still in the centre, but surrounded by people off to work in the mornings and carrying baguettes home after work.
We wandered the streets . . .
and sipped coffees along the Seine,
and ate plenty of pastries.
Since Copenhagen, I have been trying to do at least one big walk wherever I go. I have found incredible green spaces in Germany, Madrid, Barcelona, etc., but Paris offered a unique challenge in how to accomplish that sense of wandering without leaving the City or without relying on walking tours of the famous sites.
So I googled ‘covered walkways of Paris’, and set off to find as many glass pavilion style walkways as I could in one afternoon. I think the results were pretty stunning.
Paris has an old, unused railroad track the encircles the city centre “Promenade Plantee” similar to the High Line in NYC but built before the High Line and totally different. It is lined with wildflowers and rustic pathways.
And we still had the chance to explore a park along the way.
As I turned a corner, I was nicely surprised to see a little nod to one of my favourite families . . .
No disrespect to Spain and its incredible pinchos and tapas, but after 5 weeks in Spain, I was overcome with excitement at the prospect of sitting down to eat entire plates of food, just for me, without sharing . . .
The best part of any trip, side trip or not, is what you walk away with; the memories you create through travel mishaps and lucky breaks give volume and meaning to the whole experience.
On this trip, the meaning came from being in Paris with newlyweds and witnessing the wide-eyed love of a couple starting their lifetime adventure together.
I was reminded of the little gestures of affection and signs and symbols of cherishing each other that we should remember to carry into our later years with the ones we love.
And I was exposed to new things too: like the fact that they celebrate Loving Day as well as their anniversary.
On 12 June 1967, the US Supreme Court ruled in Virginia v. Loving that laws banning interracial marriage violate the US Constitution thus making interracial marriage legal across the US for the first time.
So here we are in 2024, and I have known about this landmark decision for decades, but it took this little side-trip, and this newlywed couple, to help me see the enormity of this decision, and the importance of acknowledging and keeping alive the memory of positive strides forward in human rights.
Love is Love.
Up next: wrapping up Spain.
